Poetry Lessons
Rebecca McFarlan
Poetry Analysis
Poetry is one of the most difficult genres to understand. Every word counts and every image has limitless possibilities. While no one system of analysis has all the answers, the TP-CASTT system devised by the College Board offers a tool for entering a poem, understanding its parts, and internalizing its significance to the human experience.
Title - Ponder the title before reading the poem.
Paraphrase - Translate the poem into your own words.
Clever Language - Contemplate the poem for meaning beyond the literal.
Attitude and Audience Observe both the speaker’s and the poet’s attitude (tone).
Speaker Identify the speaker and his/her audience
Shifts - Note shifts in speakers and in attitudes.
Title - Examine the title again, this time on an interpretive level.
Theme - Determine the poet’s message about what it means to be human.
1. The initial look at the title can be misleading. Sometimes the title can be ironic or contain levels of meaning beyond the obvious, but the first impressions offer a starting place for interpretation.
2. Paraphrasing will help solidify the literal, an aspect often ignored by the student. Actually translate the poem line by line into your own words. If the stanza’s meaning is obvious a sentence or two may be enough. This step is easy to skip because it is difficult to do, but it is crucial to forming more in depth understandings.
3. Connotation is where all those literary devices and terms come into play. Look for metaphor, simile, alliteration, onomatopoeia, rhyme, rhythm, and the list goes on......After identifying these elements, contemplate how these devices of language create meaning. Does more than one level of meaning exist?
4. After examining closely the connotative language, look for the speaker’s attitude. Ask if the attitude shifts and how it affects the theme (meaning).
5. Look for all kinds of shifts: place, characters, diction, structure (line/stanza length), key words (but, yet, however, although), punctuation, sound, images. Rarely does a poem end at the same place it begins. Shifts show gradual realizations of what it means to be human.
6. At this point look again at the title, this time for subtle, ironic, or multiple meanings.
7. Now that the parts have been examined, put them together. What is the theme (meaning). Ask how the theme sheds light on the human experience.
Wordsworth Presentation
· Students had their classmates finger paint three paintings as they listened to three popular songs chosen for their relation to the poetry.
· Presenters put overheads of the poems on the overhead and students guessed which songs went with which poems.
o “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud” – Cranberries, “Daffodil Lament”
o “O Gentle Sleep” – The Zombies
o “The World is Too Much With Us” - – Tracy Chapman, “The Rape of the World”
Other Fun Poetry Activities:
· Read arounds of student poetry – no pressure
· Bring in the world’s best and worst poetry
· Coffee House
· Poetry Club with the Jazz Band
· Act out a poem to an instrumental
· Magnetic Poetry
· Go outside for 3 minutes, listen to sounds, return to classroom. List 4 sounds on quadrants of paper. For each sound add 1) color 2) male/female object 3) object in the room 4) season. Then choose 2 words with a relationship to build a poem.
· Holler Back Poem – Instead of a reader response, have students write a rebuttal poem.
· Cut Shakespeare’s sonnets into individual lines and have them reassemble.
· Write a poem in response to a work of art.
Symbols
Three Categories:
Archetypal – The first symbols of humankind that have replicated themselves in stories throughout the ages and across all cultures. They appear in the stories of groups from cavemen to 21st century authors. The term “archetype:” was coined by Carl Jung who used them as the basis of “collective unconscious” theory.
Cultural – As cultural groups use archetypal symbols to represent their values, fears, beliefs, and expectations, these objects take on meaning specific to that group. For example, the cross is an ancient archetypal symbol. When cultural groups adopt it, the meanings become both universal and specific. For most cultures the cross holds spiritual significance; hence its archetypal meaning. For the Christians the cross takes on specific representation of Christ’s crucifixion.
Nuance – These objects take on symbolic meaning in the work in which they appear. Modern writers often create their own symbols by repeatedly using the object in meaningful ways. For example, Golding uses the conch shell to represent order and governmental control. Orwell uses a paper weight to represent the doomed relationship between Julia and Winston.
Notable Archetypal Symbols, Characters, and Story Patterns:
Characters:
Hero (Epic, Classical, Romantic, Realistic, Anti-Hero), Outcast, Scapegoat, Trickster, Platonic Ideal, Monster, Temptress, Star-crossed lovers, Clown/Jester, and the Prophet.
Story Patterns:
Rite of Passage/Initiation, Creation, Fall, Expulsion, Death and Rebirth, Journey, and, Quest
Symbols (Archetypal symbols have a dual nature and are often objects that we find in nature):
Water, Fire, Wind, Earth, All Colors, Snakes, Birds/Flight, Trees, Gold, Iron, Silver, Sun, Moon, Cross, the Four Seasons
Why study myth and symbols?
· They enrich our encounters with art and literature as we discover the layers of meaning they hold.
· We understand the values of cultures different from our own and at the same time discover the universality of the human experience.
Can we read too much into symbolism?
· Absolutely. If interpretations don’t make sense in the context of the work as a whole, we are probably stretching.
Do authors intentionally use symbols?
· The question is moot. An author’s work takes on a life of its own after it is created. The message it communicates succeeds or fails as audiences encounter it. If the archetypes and symbols communicate with others, then the author has created a work that is not only his/her property, but also that of the reader/viewer. That said, most artists are familiar with symbols and their traditional meanings. Whether they emerge from the subconscious or intentionally doesn’t really matter.
Poetry Review
Today in order to prepare for the poetry parts of the AP Exam, you will work with some older poets. Those seem to be causing the most trouble on our practice exams. All work should be completed today. One of the skills we need to work on is speed in analyzing poetry. Another is articulating “how the poem means,” in other words what literary devices and rhetorical strategies does the poet use?
1. You have been divided into groups and assigned a poet. Get a Dover edition book for that poet and choose as a group one poem of at least 30 lines.
2. As a group analyze the poem for its thematic meaning. You might consider using TP CASTT or SOAPSTones if you are at a loss as to where to begin. Whatever method you choose your final analysis should include the literal meaning of the poem, the theme, the tone, and a list of devices used along with the lines (write them out please) in which they occur.
3. After your group has a solid understanding of the poem, write five good AP type multiple choice questions and an essay prompt for the work.
4. Next you should find a picture that represents the essence of the poem. You may use the internet, one of the art books in the room, or one that you draw. If you choose to draw a picture, art materials are in the tall cabinet.
5. Finally, as a group write a parody of the poem using the theme and/or form as a reference point. I don’t expect prize winners, but rather evidence that you have internalized the poem enough to allude to it in a sustained way.
American Poetry Project
Assignment: You will choose a poet from the list of American poets and research that poet’s life, works, and criticism. Beginning May 10th, you will present your poet to the class for consideration as the next American Poet Laureate. Your final project and presentation will include the following:
· a title page appropriate for that poet
· a bibliography of the poet’s works
· a timeline of poem publication and the historical events in the author’s life
· a general introduction to the poet’s writing (one to two pages)
· a collection of 15 poems from that poet
· five poems of the 15 analyzed in the TPCASTT format
· five poems of the fifteen with explications of your own for each poem
· two poems with a combined written analysis including criticism, parenthetical documentation, and a works cited page
· an annotated bibliography of five literary criticisms about that poet (or if enough criticism is not available: five additional poems with explications)
· a final works cited for the whole project
· an overhead transparency of at least one poem to be discussed during your presentation in which you discuss why your chosen poet demonstrates the qualities of the American Poet Laureate
For each class, one 2002-2003 Junior Class American Poet Laureate will be chosen. Class vote, based upon strength and persuasion of the presentation, will determine the winner for that class. Extra credit will be awarded for this honor.
Necessary Information: All projects are due May 13. Extra credit will be awarded for presenting on May 10. Only one person per poet. You must sign up for your poet with me.
Modernist Poetry
Student Led Lessons
Laurence Perrine suggests, “People have read poetry or listened to it or recited it because they liked it, because it gave them enjoyment. But this is not the whole answer. Poetry in all ages has been regarded as important, not simply as one of several alternative forms of amusement, as one person might choose bowling, another chess, and another poetry. Rather, it has been regarded as something central to existence, something having unique value to the fully realized life, something that we are better off for having and without which we are spiritually impoverished.”
John Ciardi writes, “Everyone who has an emotion and a language knows something about poetry. What he knows may not be much on an absolute scale, and it may not be organized within him in a useful way, but once he discovers the pleasure of poetry, he is likely to be surprised to discover how much he always knew without knowing he knew it. He may discover, somewhat as the character in the French play discovered to his amazement that he had been talking prose all his life, that he had been living poetry. Poetry, after all, is about life. Anyone who is alive and conscious must have some information about it.”
Your group will teach assigned poems by one of the major modernist poets: Hardy, Eliot, Yeats, Lawrence, Auden, and D. Thomas
These presentations should capture both the life of the poetry as well as the art of it.
Your group will be responsible for teaching a poem by your assigned poet for one-half of a regular class period. We will cover two poets on each of the next three Fridays: March 7, 14 and 21.
Remember that a good presentation has variety, audience involvement, and substantive material. You will not receive higher than a “C” if you tell the class what the poem means! If group members are absent, the show will go on!
Presentations should include:
a) Music that enhances meaning and copies of sufficient lyrics to understand meaning
b) Art work that augments meaning
c) Vocabulary
d) Activities that engage the audience
e) Selected biographical details
Your audience should have an understanding of:
a) Theme
b) Tone (Attitude)
c) Language Devices (please include sound devices)
d) Historical background
e) Syntax
March 7 – Hardy and Yeats
March 14 – Lawrence and Eliot
March 21 – D. Thomas and Auden
Hardy “The Man He Killed”
Yeats “Sailing to Byzantium
Lawrence “Snake”
Eliot “The Journey of the Magi”
Thomas “Do not Go Gentle Into that Good Night
Auden “Musee des Beaux Arts”
Form Follows Function - Shakespearean Sonnets
Directions: Using you knowledge of sonnet forms and your extensive understanding of poetic devices, unlock Shakespeare’s theme in each of the following sonnets. Then answer the questions that follow each sonnet.
XXIX.
When, in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes,
I all alone beweep my outcast state
And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries
And look upon myself and curse my fate,
Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featured like him, like him with friends possess'd,
Desiring this man's art and that man's scope,
With what I most enjoy contented least;
Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,
Haply I think on thee, and then my state,
Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven's gate;
For thy sweet love remember'd such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings.
1. What noteworthy syntax, diction, or literary devices does this poem contain?
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2. How do the quatrains and couplet relate to one another?
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3. Write a sentence that encapsulates both the theme and tone of this sonnet.
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XXX.
When to the sessions of sweet silent thought
I summon up remembrance of things past,
I sigh the lack of many a thing I sought,
And with old woes new wail my dear time's waste:
Then can I drown an eye, unused to flow,
For precious friends hid in death's dateless night,
And weep afresh love's long since cancell'd woe,
And moan the expense of many a vanish'd sight:
Then can I grieve at grievances foregone,
And heavily from woe to woe tell o'er
The sad account of fore-bemoaned moan,
Which I new pay as if not paid before.
But if the while I think on thee, dear friend,
All losses are restored and sorrows end.
4. What noteworthy syntax, diction, or literary devices does this poem contain?
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5. How do the quatrains and couplet relate to one another?